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“Ate Vi” As “Darna”

“Ate Vi” in the title of this article refers to Vilma Santos, a movie and television actress who started her career in show business in the Philippines as child star. She later continue her career in her teenage and adult years.

She later became a city mayor (Lipa City in Batangas), a governor of a Southern Luzon province (Batangas) and recently was elected as a Member of the House of Representatives (Lone District-Lipa City, Batangas).

For this feature post, we are taking a stroll down memory lane about the movies released in the 1970s where she played “Darna”, a super heroine created by comic book novelist Mars Ravelo.

“Lipad, Darna, Lipad!”

The title translated into the English language means “Fly, Darna, Fly!“

In her first appearance as Darna, the super heroine has a human alter ego named Narda. She will transform into Darna when she swallows a stone in her mouth and shouts the word “Darna”.

The film presented three story lines where she faced three different antagonists. They were portrayed by Gloria Romero, Celia Rodriguez and Liza Lorena.

Romero played a strict teacher in Narda’s home town who turned out to be a secret practitioner of witch craft and black magic which earned her the monicker “Babaing Impakta”.

Rodriguez was Valentina, a lady fashion model who has as serpents as hairs in her head making her the goddess of snakes. She is called the “Babaing Ahas” (Snake Woman) because of her power to command several types of snakes to sow terror among the populace.

Lorena was “Babaing Lawin” (Hawk Lady), a woman with wings on her back making her a bird like human. She came from a large egg that came out from a volcano during a major eruption.

Darna was able to defeat the three with difficulties and challenges along the way.

“Darna And The Giants”

In this movie, Darna fought the giants played by Divina Valencia, Ike Lozada, Max Alvarado and Cesar Ramirez.

The latter were former humans who became giants because of a serum injected in their bodies by aliens from another planet led by “X-3-X” played by Helen Gamboa in her first role as a villainess.

She wanted to conquer the Earth by using these giants as instruments of mass destruction and terror. She ordered her comrades to abduct humans who have potentials to be giants like excellent athletes and young people.

She killed the characters played by Valencia, Lozada and Alvarado when the latter had changes of heart in terrorizing the people because they remembered their peaceful and humble origins as humans. They requested the former to stop her plans, but she did not listen and killed them instead when she felt that they are now useless for her purpose.

In the end, Darna reached the villain’s lair and destroyed all the equipment and devices that the aliens used including their space ship. The invaders from outer space and the giant played by Ramirez were vanquished by the super heroine.

“Darna Vs Planet Women”

This time Darna is up against the Planet Women played by Rosanna Ortiz, Eva Linda, Lita Vasquez, Lieza Zobel and Diana Villa.

The said lady aliens from another planet have different colors of skin and hair. They were sent by their mother planet to Earth for a mission to study the latter.The tasks include looking for scientists who are experts in their field of study and visiting communication and related facilities that will help their purpose. From their end, these said tasks are beneficial, but not for the Earth and its people. These are the reasons why they had their individual and group encounters with Darna.

It turned out that their home planet is dealing with the major problems of survival and population issues. The leader of the planet women played by Ortiz decided to take this matter in her own hands with the character played by Zandro Zamora as her subject.

With Darna defeating them in all of their encounters against her, they decided to stop their mission and planned to return home in their world of origin.

The images that were used for this feature post were taken from selected online resources as references.

With special mention to the Video 48 Blog to acknowledge the inputs provided by the three movie posters in coming up with this article.

Classic superheroine film based from the comicbook story by Mars Ravelo serialized in comics TV films & media starring Vilma Santos portrayed since 1973-80 film series a true classic from the Philippines. Thanks for the information. From:Wayne